


The Desperate

by FearOrRegret



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, More like character undeath, Zombie AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-15
Updated: 2018-11-14
Packaged: 2019-08-23 21:15:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16626590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FearOrRegret/pseuds/FearOrRegret
Summary: Chapter 1 of my Zombie Apocalypse AU inspired by a one-shot I wrote for Undead McCree. Props to my tumblr buddy (you know who you are) for helping me with the title.Six months into the undead plague that's consuming the Earth, things start to take a turn for the worst.





	The Desperate

The months that had passed were only apparent by the changing of the season. Winter had come, the cold only slowing the spread of the virus, and melted away in its time. Six months. Maybe six and a half. Penny had been counting the days, a routine that made the undead horrors around her easier to accept. But she was growing weary of the endless hiking in search of food and shelter, and, no matter how he tried to hide it, she knew Jesse's strength was wearing thin, too. She could read it in his increasingly stiff posture, the exhaustion etched into his pailing face. Survival had been a strain on both of them. Scavenging for food and fleeing predators like rats was a tiring living. He had the worst of it.  
  
From the beginning he had been her protector. She would have died months ago without him, and he dutifully defended her from each threat that arose. Undead or not, the monsters prowling the streets were too human for her to harm, and as time went on the living became an even bigger danger. She needed him for safety as much as company.  
  
With the budding spring weather, her allergies started to resurface leaving her with a persistent sniffle. She wiped her nose on the least aggravating part of her sleeve as they trudged down an abandoned state highway. With any luck they would come across a pharmacy they could loot for medicine. Unplundered stores were rare at this point, but she would need something to sooth her irritated sinuses.  
  
Except for the distant look in his eye, Jesse seemed to be in good health. Or the best health he could be in considering. He'd been distracted the last week, more so than when food was scarce. He did his best to hide it, but Penny knew better.  
  
Ammo was in short supply and had been for a month. At night when he dismantled his gun to clean it, she noticed that he counted the remaining bullets. She'd started counting too, pretending to sleep so he wouldn't notice her watching. Together they watched the numbers dwindle with each creature they encountered until only three were left. Without a word exchanged between them, they agreed to move more carefully. They stuck to less traveled roads and avoided all but the emptiest settlements. Anything to avoid a confrontation.  
  
Ahead of them the highway became a short bridge over a deep ravine cut by a creek, and just across it they could see the makings of a small country town. Single story brick buildings lined a small grid of unkempt roads punctuated by a couple of traffic lights. No cars littered the road the way they had seen in so many other cities, and the traffic lights alternated green, yellow, red, indifferent to the vacant streets below them.  
  
They trekked across the bridge, sweeping the scenery in the distance for any signs of movement. The wind picked up scraps of garbage and carried it over the tops of their boots. The town remained still. They passed a second hand dress shop, dirtied but undamaged. A mom and pop convenience store, reeking too strongly of decay to be explored. A pharmacy, the skeleton of shelves its only remains. Just past the second intersection Penny spotted a building with dogs painted in the window.  
  
"A vet?" was Jesse's skeptical response.  
  
"It's worth a look."  
  
Whether the patients were human or not, it was still a doctor's office. The front entrance was locked with steel bars on the inside of the glass. Around the back of the building they found the door opened as wide as it would go, and let themselves in.  
  
The back room was lined with empty kennels both large and small. Beyond that there was an office and a small lab area for running tests and then a series of exam rooms leading to the front of the building. The office door stood ajar with the lock apparently broken off.  
  
Penny began opening each drawer and cabinet in turn searching for anything useful while Jesse went to search the office. Predictably there were no drugs left to be taken, just scattered handfuls of gauze and plastic gloves. She dropped her backpack and set about fitting the cleaner rolls of gauze into it. The gloves weren't as clean as she would have liked, but she took them anyways.  
  
A gunshot sounded from the office shaking the silence that had been putting her at ease. Two left. She jumped at the sudden noise, securing her bag in case they needed to run. A moment later a second shot rang out. One left. Quiet settled over the building again as though it had never been disturbed in the first place.  
  
"Are you okay?" she called down the hall.  
  
No answer.  
  
She followed the sound of Jesse cursing every god he had a mind to name to the office. He met her at the door, leaning heavily against it and pressing a palm to his jaw just below his ear. Blood leaked between his fingers--so strongly crimson that she barely believed it was real--and stained his collar in a slowly spreading pool. The look in his eye was one she'd seen too many times before. The broken gaze of a man who knows his time is up. She had prayed that she'd only see this moment in nightmares. So much for prayer.  
  
"Mother fucker," were the only words she managed to say as the gravity of what was happening occurred to her. She helped him find a place to sit in the closest exam room and held a shaking handful of bandages against his wound. He laughed at the gesture, an emotionless impression of a chuckle.  
  
"You know that won't help," he reminded her.  
  
"I have to do something," she told him stubbornly.  
  
She'd seen others on the road, people they had passed in their traveling, turn in less than a minute. It was an unsettling process to watch. Some bled out quickly. Others held on until they were delirious from fever or pain or both. However they went, they all ended the same way. All their fear and anger and regrets replaced with a chilling bottomless hunger. There was no guarantee that she was buying any time, but stopping the bleeding was all she could think to do. He was all she had left, and she'd go through hell to keep him by her side. There had to be a solution. Some quick fix that no one had thought to try yet. She just needed time to think.  
  
"Here."  
  
Jesse took over holding the soaked bandages in place and handed her his gun instead. She held it uncertainly. Months had passed since she'd last picked it up, but she remembered the way it felt that day when he'd lined up empty cans for her to practice shooting. Dangerous. Powerful. The kick was so hard that the first shot made her wrist hurt. At the end of the day she'd returned it to him, happy to let him carry it and hoping she'd never need to use what she'd learned.  
  
"There's only one bullet left so make it count," he told her. His breathing was already becoming shallow. He rested his head against the wall behind him and shut his eyes lightly.  
  
"Please don't go," she begged.  
  
"Not going anywhere, pumpkin. I'm right here."  
  
"I can't do this alone. Please."  
  
"You're okay...be home soon...just a little late," he murmured. He could have been talking in his sleep in better circumstances. "Don't worry, she's watching."  
  
Not being able to pull the trigger didn't make Penny weak; it made her kind. That's what he had told her from day one when she'd stood there struggling to find the strength to pull the trigger on the creature that would have eaten her alive if it weren't for Jesse's quick reflexes. And that's what she repeated to herself now. She had just stood there, both hands clasped around the weapon to support its weight, and watched her love's life slip away, babbling nonsense to himself all the while. She was too kind to put a bullet in his head, not too weak.  
  
There wasn't time to cry. In minutes he'd be one of them and she would have to make the choice again. Use the final bullet to execute him or save it for what lies ahead? He'd only said to make it count. No more or less. She set to work muttering her mantra as she rifled through what hadn't already been looted. Kind, not weak. With the sharpest scalpel she could find she cut a large muzzle to fit a human face and fastened it over his mouth. No more biting. She stepped back to examine her handy work, and the sight of him tied up like a beaten dog made her stomach turn.  
  
She searched again for a gentler alternative and, finding none, settled on using a bandana to cover the harsh lattice of his new mask. The ones she found were decorated with pumpkins, bats, and skeletons. How fitting that the outbreak had started just before Halloween. She chose one with a large skull printed on the center of it and tied it over the muzzle. It was better than nothing. Finally she found a heavy chain leash and attached it to the muzzle. The undead didn't seem to retain any of their living strength. If so, she could easily keep him nearby.  
  
Satisfied with her work, she brushed his hair out of his face and waited while he began to stir as if waking from a heavy sleep.  
  
"Come on," she said with a tentative tug on the lead. "We need to get out of here."


End file.
